In a recent court decision‚ Fox News got turned down when trying to get files about Smartmaticʼs co-founderʼs legal problems in the Philippines (which involve some bribery charges)
The media giant wanted this info to help defend itself in a huge money case: Smartmatic is asking for $2.7-billion in a defamation suit thats been going on since the last presidential election. The voting-tech company says Fox hurt its whole business by putting wrong info on-air about vote counting and election results
Back in late-2020‚ Fox News ran several broadcasts that talked about Smartmaticʼs role in the election process; these shows had some claims about vote-rigging that the tech company says were totally made-up. The company points out that these wrong stories really messed-up their work and reputation – making their business take a big hit
The judgeʼs choice to keep these documents private means Fox will need to work on its defense using other stuff; its just one more step in this super-expensive legal fight that started about 4 years ago